fuck this
fuck this
Friendly reminder: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/yes-science-is-political/
670 comments
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honey look, freedom of expression and the right to protest in America just
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Let's not keep making the mistake of assuming Trump's tweets have force of law. He's just talking out of his ass again, just like he's not actually invading greenland and canada. Notice how he's talking about at least 4 different actions here, I'm pretty sure none of which he can actually do. 5 if you count thanking us for our attention to this matter (?). If Trump tries to do anything in this regard no judge* will uphold it.
*Obligatory other than Clarence Thomas
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People in power do what he says. His word is de facto law, even if it’s illegal. It literally does not matter. You are in denial if you think he’s not going to get away with this.
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Let's not keep making the mistake of assuming the rule of law matters at this point. If he does something and nobody stops it, its legality or lack there of is moot. If he says to do something and people do it and nobody stops him (or judge's rulings about it are ignored), then it doesn't matter that it was illegal.
I know you're just trying to get people to calm down, but at this point, people are right to be scared and right to think these things could actually come to pass considering it has happened before. Maybe it won't get that far... But plenty has already happened that should never have happened, and the US currently has a president who is illegally, specifically unconstitutionally, holding office and was allowed to be sworn in anyway, so it's probably not a good idea to assume this won't happen just because it's also unconstitutional.
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Hey remember that wall that didn’t get built?
The fact that no one is trolling him about it shows how people are weirdly compliant about all this.
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I swallowed my misgivings and voted Democrat, just like I've done at each election since I turned 18, but handwaving away valid criticisms is not how you get people to side with you. Pressure needs to be put on the democrats to be better, too.
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Yep, I voted D like I always did...
But I spent a lot of time ringing any alarm bell I could find that all of Joe and Kamal's moves to the right was gonna cost us the election, and that the victory fund would lose the House and Senate.
I was right on all counts, but the people I was trying to explain it won't admit that reality proved them wrong.
There's no criticism for what the party did wrong, only anger at anyone with higher standards than the letter by the name.
Neoliberals want nothing as much as they want blindly loyal Dem voters, it's the only way most people ever hold their noses and vote for one. But rather than have a candidate dem voters want, they'd rather risk trump.
When they shut on voters like in that meme, they're telling us they have zero problem watching the country burn. They'd rather have trump than a Dem who agrees with Dem voters.
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No one is hand waving away anything by asking people to vote
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The argument, was the least bad between two bads. This is way worse than the alternative would ever get
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handwaving away valid criticisms
If you look carefully, you'll find statements about how "neither option affects [this particular thing] but we have the best chance of fixing it after the election if we still have a country".
It was never handwaved. It was the least-worse option with some kind of hope given that issue and a thousand others. How many times this has fucking been fucking explained and not fucking understood.
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Pressure needs to be put on the democrats to be better, too.
They're already 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000x better than Republicans. So someone would have to be pretty goddamn stupid not to vote for them when the options are them or Republicans.
The majority of the fault isn't on Democrats. It's on goddamn stupid braindead asshole American voters for being goddamn stupid braindead assholes.
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I'm not American so nobody got my vote, but seems to me like the issue is with the swathes of people choosing facism rather than progressives who chose not to vote.
Choosing how to act in a world like ours is tricky, anyone following a sense of right and wrong (even if I disagree with their judgement) instead of fear, hate, greed or whatever gets a gold star in my book.
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Inaction is still a choice, though. I totally understand the sentiment behind that choice and even agree that we shouldn't be forced to choose genocide, but the alternative that we got is a man who not only wants the same genocide, but wants to accelerate it, put American boots on the ground to assist in it, and then turn the bloodied ground into resorts while also wanting to worsen life across the globe. So, by refusing to act, they didn't oppose that man getting into power. They cared so much about genocide that, ironically, they enabled making that genocide worse by not acting against that possibility.
The biggest issue, though, is with the people who couldn't be bothered enough to vote. Some, what, 40% of Americans never vote? Of course, there's plenty there who can't due to things like gerrymandering, but there's a huge swathe of white suburbanites who simply prefer the status quo to actually improving things.
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Biden also surpressed student protests. This isn't the gotcha you think it is
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Putting Genocide Joe in scare quotes. Libs are going fully mask-off in this thread.
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Blue MAGA
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If the Democrats wanted me to vote for their candidate they should have picked one that didn't suck balls
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I feel a lot of people do a lot to justify stupid behaviour. "Saving is too hard" or "exercise is too hard". There's legit reasons to not be able to save, or exercise or being able to vote 🤨.
However there's a lot of bullshit that people were spouting. It's either a coordinated campaign or just dumb shit. What annoys me is everyone piling on Joe and then they did what people wanted and swapped to Kamala and they're still upset that the Dems "don't listen". Whatever, they're all full of it.
I fucking hate the Democrats but you have to be completely psycho to justify not-voting for them.
To be clear, I'm Canadian and I'm directly impacted by this now. So fuck all of those people.
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Why are we still talking about this? It's over, and we can't undo the results.
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While I did vote blue conservative (for the last time), they were not worthy of that vote because they did not represent me. That's how representative democracy works. What you advocate for is not representative democracy, it is a hostage situation and should be treated like the crisis that that entails.
Why are you okay with people being underrepresented at the voting booth? Are you actively working to replace First Past the Post voting in your state? People should have the freedom to vote for the candidates they believe are best, while still ensuring their votes count against those they don’t want in office.
It's not as though democrats are just now learning of the mathematical flaws of FPTP. Every election I've seen the same bullshit excuses to take people's inalienable right to vote how they want. Democrats in blue states made a choice to leave a huge portion of the population unrepresented, all for safe states and easy elections.
We don’t need to wait for a miracle from Congress, we can pass election reform one state at a time. Should we have more elections, we must remove the democratic monopoly on this fight against the republicans. Don't worry, blue conservative, you will be free to vote for your preference under a more representative electoral system. Because who would want to deny someone the right to vote for the person they feel is best? You apparently.
Alaska has already abolished FPTP voting. After Ranked Choice Voting kept Sarah Palin out of office, Alaskan Republicans tried to pass a referendum to revert to FPTP, but the people voted to keep Ranked Choice. Why would you want to use the same voting system that Republicans favor? Do you support democracy, or do you get off on forcing people unrepresented in government to vote for your preference?
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Nobody pushing genocide is worthy of votes or support.
It was incumbent on Dems to EARN votes, and they failed spectacularly. You’re wrong to try blaming voters for failings of our corrupt politicians.
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So this includes trump for his support of two separate groups that have demonstrated willingness to commit genocide.
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Virtue signaling doesn't wash blood off your hands sweetie
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Imagine thinking 5 people on the internet caused Trump to win.
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They only had $1,500,000,00 to spend on Biden/Harris....
How is that supposed to counter the majority of Dem voters not wanting the Dem candidate?
What are they supposed to do?
Run a fair primary, back the winning candidate in the general, and stop bankrupting state parties?!
George Clooney doesn't eat dinner for free ya know....
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zuck, Elon, bezos.... those three are on the internet. got 2 more?
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“…illegal protest…”?
Oh right, the US Constitution doesn’t exist any more.
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Next time an american speaks about "muh first amendment", "USA only free speech country in the world" bullshit, show them this
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You are not wrong. The Supreme Court finding presidential immunity and then allowing an insurrectionist to run in contravention of the 14th amendment seems to have finally put the old document to rest.
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We live according to royal decree now.
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lol it never has the united states has a long history of killing, maiming, and imprisoning protestors
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Correct
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now you're catching on! You'll be head of a department in no time under drumpf's regime!
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I mean just to be fair isn't it illegal to have a huge protest without informing the authorities first? Also violent protests would be illegal too, right?
These assumptions are based on similar laws from other countries. But I don't really believe Trump is talking about those protests or just planning to forbid them from getting permission to happen.
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This is the same as the Zelensky trap. They're going to cut federal funding regardless. The just plan on getting you to bend the knee before hand.
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This exactly. Higher education hurts them in the long run so it was never going to get a pass. It’ll be gutted so that private schools can take over. This is just a way to put the blame on the universities and students who don’t bend to their will.
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It’ll be gutted so that private schools can take over
Maybe. If it resists. If it fails to resist it will be turned into an institution responsible for communicating a fascist ideology.
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Apparantly, (in the US) any protest that needs to occupy the road requires a permit. Yea imagine how stupid it is, you want to protest the government and you need to apply for permission?!? I was shocked when my teacher told me about this. Seems like a huge First Amendment violation to me, but society just goes along with it. 😓
So unless your protest is strictly on the sidewalk, you need a permit. So fucking dumb.
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You don’t need a permit to march in the streets or on sidewalks, as long as marchers don’t obstruct car or pedestrian traffic. And that makes a lot of sense because if you block a road perhaps emergency services need to know ahead of time that they can't take that route. Or others concerns may be relevant. For the very same reasons this is similar in countries around the world. Source: https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/protesters-rights
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Its the same everywhere, doesn't mean it's not dumb but that's how it is.
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Well yeah, keep your dumbasses out the fucking street.
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That permit is worth as much to them as the original piece of paper in the scene.
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances
1st ammendment to the constitution since conservatives love to claim they support it
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Bold of you to assume that the US is a country still under the rule.of law.
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Laws only matter if they are enforced.
The right wing doesn't care about law or consistency. They care about in-groups to protect and out groups to bind.
If "how do treat strangers" is a viable metric for assessing if someone is a good person or not, the the right wing are not good people.
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Nah I'm pretty sure the 1st amendment just says I can say the N word /s
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Yeah but they're gonna rewrite the constitution, it's gonna be the best constitution the founding fathers will be jealous they didn't come up with this thing it's gonna be airtight and on the blockchain
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Oh, we don't use that outdated piece of paper any more, haven't you heard?
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Yeah, it's way too woke. Same with Jesus.
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Congress isn't making a law. Instead, the President is committing treason while his party pretends not to notice and the other party flops around like a dead fish.
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That's not a problem if executive orders are treated as law; the first amendment doesn't curtail the president's power.
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Mask up. Leave your phones at home. Break shit.
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They won't. They couldn't even get upset over kids being massacred every week in their schools. They are a broken people. Have been for decades. Their military.and economy didn't fail. Their moral fiber did. They substituted thoughts and prayers and other virtue signalling for community organisation and direct action.
If you think I am wrong then don't reply. Go outside and prove it. Nobody gives a shit what people write in social media. It means nothing.
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You're spot on... I might argue that that moral fiber has pretty much never existed. But do you have any insight on how one even begins to restore that moral fiber?
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Gimme a break, I don't expect you to know everything that goes on here, just as all I "know" about Australia is "you" made Murdoch, continue to abuse native people just like us, and dingos regularly eat babies. Like asserting that no Australian people care about those issues is wrong and obviously my fundamental understanding of the country is flawed, it's also wrongheaded to assert the American people are all broken and spineless for years and have bad moral fiber (I'll assume this is a normal saying for y'all elsewhere, but that sounds like a nationalistic dog whistle to my ears).
It is especially bizarre to claim that Americans are incapable of direct action a few years after the country had some pretty explosive sustained protests against police violence and racism. The US is filled with broken people, yes, but not because of some nebulous moral failing, and it's the broken government you have an issue with, not the poor fools who were born here.
Looking to the mentioned protests a few years back might explain the lack of similar reaction now. They burned youth prisons, occupied police stations, ran for office, took to the streets, were shot at, gassed, and went to jail. For what? Nothing changed endured, the establishment "left" abandoned the movement and helped undo any change that occured, the government clamped down harder on dissent, and Trump got reelected. Maybe the methods of resistance have to change to succeed, you cant keep fighting the war of yesterday and expect to win after all, and you sure don't have to publicize your actions for online strangers to check your moral fiber.
Posting may be meaningless, but I'd say all this to your face if we were talking in person too. Communication is how we change and change minds, and leaving nonsense unchallenged is how we got into this mess in the first place, and I won't make that mistake here or in my non digital life.
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What's an illegal protest? I thought first amendment speech covered that
Also, how can he expel a student from a school he doesn't control? or does he mean expel students from the country?
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An illegal protest, according to conservatives, is any protest they disagree with. Waving picket signs or blocking traffic is disruptive, destructive, and illegal. Storming the capitol is, on the other hand, a perfectly acceptable peaceful protest.
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Yep. Nationwide nonviolent sit in protests? Pass laws to make it legal to run them down on a car if you feel threatened.
Violent storming of the seat of our nations power and symbolic political heart? Oh that's just some guys being dudes.
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Straight out of the dictators handbook.
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This is my go-to explanation, but christofascists don’t care.
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Since many answers aren't actually answering the question...
My comment is largely wrong!! See the reply below
Most places require a permit to assemble en masse. There are "free speech zones" where you can create large gatherings without any kind of advance notice or permit or whatever. Most universities have a free speech zone towards the middle of their campuses. Cities will also often have at least one but somewhere that doesn't inconvenience commerce, like a park or near city hall.Most mass assembly requires a permit and sometimes a fee, even in public places. Following this prevents arrest by "disturbing the peace" or other such laws, usually.How this squares with the first amendment is interpretation. Individual freedom of speech is protected except very specific public order and safety things, e.g. calling for violence. Coordinated, mass freedom of speech is perceived as a fast path to rioting.I'm not saying this is right, but this is my understanding of how things work. I'm not a lawyer or an expert in these matters. This is just what I learned from activist friends in my university time ages ago.As for expulsion, public universities are run by states. To my understand, Trump has no legal mechanism to do this. He's just talking out of his ass or expects to bully public institutions into expelling students by threatening to withhold department of education funding... but he's planning to kill that anyway, so 🤷♂️
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I spent most of my 20s doing grassroots campaigning, with a large part of it being protest planning and organization. You generally do not need a permit to conduct protests on public property, even large ones, in the USA.
The exceptions are very specific; i.e. blocking roads may require a permit.
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He doesn’t give a shit about the speech. It’s the schools and universities he wants to harm. Even if it’s just a matter of disrupting them through legal overwhelm.
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The schools don't give a shit about free speech either.
Trump and the schools just want to attack anti-genocide protestors.
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Remember, he’s only got the intelligence of a kumquat. He doesn’t even understand that he’s too stupid to understand anything. He vomits whatever he thinks give his followers happy endings.
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What’s an illegal protest? I
Opposing genocide.
I thought first amendment speech covered that
Oh you precious child.
Also, how can he expel a student from a school he doesn’t control? or does he mean expel students from the country?
The schools don't need Trump to expel their own students.
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Yes. Also no.
It means all things and nothing at the same time.
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This happened before: https://en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sophie_Scholl
a German student and anti-Nazi political activist, active within the White Rose non-violent resistance group in Nazi Germany. She was convicted of high treason after having been found distributing anti-war leaflets at the University of Munich(LMU) with her brother, Hans.
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"Such a splendid sunny day, and I have to go. But how many have to die on the battlefield in these days, how many young, promising lives... What does my death matter if by our acts thousands are warned and alerted. Among the student body there will certainly be a revolt."
She's bae.
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RIP hero
Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don't dare express themselves as we did.
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Also, happening right now in russia with any anti-war protests
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I'm more of a Black Orchestra but big props to the White Rose
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All federal funding will stop
That's the only part here anyone needs to know.
He'll threaten to pull funding for his stupid pet issues first, then pull it anyways for everyone else.
Therefore, fucking ignore his threats, nothing you can do will ever appease him and he will go back on his own word like it's a bodily function.
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Ill do whatever the fuck I want removed, shut the fuck up and go suck Elons dick.
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go suck Elons dick.
that would be the fifth time today, give them a break
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Does "NO MASKS" mean that choosing to wear a mask to protect your health is now forbidden at colleges or is there another meaning that I don't understand? It is so random and has nothing to do with the rest of the post except for being "woke".
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Probably making wearing any mask while protesting illegal, regardless of the legality of the protest itself.
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They don't want people concealing their identity to avoid police following them after protests.
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Yeah, only the police are allowed to conceal their identity
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Wouldn't surprise me if they were STILL removed about having been forced to wear masks 5 years ago lmaooo
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Masks are for hiding your identity.
But perhaps the double context is intentional.
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For loads of clinically vulnerable people, the right to protest is dependent on the right to mask. You can only risk going to a crowded protest if you’re allowed to use protective measures to prevent infections.
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Not random, masks make it harder for the facial recognition cameras.
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Ah yes, that free speech that Musk is always taking about.
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You're free to say whatever you want, as long as it doesn't hurt the president's feelings.
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Hey Muricans, this is what you wanted and voted for (or could't be bother voting to prevent)... enjoy
or, hit the streets and remove the fascist gov you elected
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I feel like the overlap of fediverse users and trump voters is close to 0
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I try not to let perfect be the enemy of good, but I do my bit to make them feel unwelcome.
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Honestly I'm just scared. I tried the civil way and voted and protested and went to marches and told everyone I knew. But now I'm just scared, it seems like the only option left is action of a violent nature and I don't know if I'm mentally prepared to throw my life away in prison or dead to try and stop the fascism. I know I have guns and if it tries to take me from my home I won't go down quietly, but I'm just scared to make the first move only to end up a martyr.
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What does he think "illegal" means? Is he getting rid of the first amendment?
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That word doesn't mean anything to him, except as a tool to prosecute people he doesn't like. Obviously laws and illegality don't mean shit when it's him breaking the law.
Pretty sure there is enough evidence for treason at this point, but Congress won't act on it.
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I think illigal means dissenting (or brown)..
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In his mind (to clarify)
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He also thinks he can order a private school to expell students.. he's just not smart.
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Even if it works.. it would not label him as smart, just unreasonably powerful (money full)
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But also that it's DEI DEMOCRAT OVERREACH to have a black woman in an administrative role.
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That's the weasel word that lets the right know exactly what he means but still able to pretend like it isn't what he means.
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Well he also did an executive order, that only he is allowed to interpret the law, so... Whatever he feels like is illegal is illegal.
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Well there you go kids, he just explicitly named exactly all the things you should be doing.
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They want violence.
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Putin sure wants the US to tear itself apart and sever ties with western allies. And what's the Trump administration doing again...?
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this is his plan all alone, one of inner circle wrote the book on geopolitics, and even in the 80 they deemed trump to a potential useful president one day.
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I remember when the Democrats brought down the hammer hard on anti-genocide protestors in universities. Trump is doing the same, but expanding it to all protests.
May 10, 2024 Map: Where university protesters have been arrested across the United States
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Did they use guns and kill people? Because that is what trump will be ordering - Kent state style
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Killing protesters is too visible and often sparks outrage. Quietly deporting them or using behind-the-scenes methods to remove them is more discreet and allows the agenda to progress with less resistance.
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Well that's easy. The protests aren't illegal. Therefore this amounts to nothing.
Fuck this dude.
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Ah there goes another thing that distinguished the USA from China and Russia.
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Americans doing something americanly in america: "what are we, a bunch of asians?"
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I didn’t think it was possible to hate this fucker more and more each day and yet here we are.
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
John F. Kennedy
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Americans, you are living under a fascist regime.
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We are very aware.
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Let me see, USA becoming a dictatorship... BINGO!
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This is something that only the Judiciary can declare (by failing to do anything), so I think it takes more than a few weeks.
But the Executive sure is working towards it.
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The judiciary only has power if the executive accepts that it has power.
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At this point and with all these new and ilogical rules, Trump is basically Dolores Umbridge!
We need a giant to take him down!
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Again. Right from the play book
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The dictators handbook, yes.
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Project 2025
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Last time I checked, people had a right to peaceful assembly and to protest.
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Check again
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If they send the gestapo to crack skulls, who's going to stop them?
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Sound alot like how russia works.
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1st4th5th6th8th14th
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No masks, says the guy with the supporters wearing masks and carrying nazi flags
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We need something like this for daytime.
Also, read up on what they are ultimately going for: Eliminating the First Amendment
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Trump supporters: "that's fine, the president isn't congress"
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I used to be the pride of my family for having finished college. Now it's demonized by them.
I feel for the students of today. College was an important time for me. I experienced a lot of new ideas, my mind was opened. I didn't get to do much in grad school, but my first four years of college changed me and I wouldn't be the same without those experiences. The way the situation is escalating we may see colleges completely locked down or even abolished.
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GG America. You better gear up for your own Maidan soon enough if you want to keep your rights.
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I'm not in his district but I was so impressed by Rep. AL Green's (https://algreen.house.gov/about) courage in standing up to and calling out Krasnov's and the GOP's lies yesterday that I wanted to donate some money. Unlike all the impotent, sclerotic clowns who call themselves the Dem "leadership" and constantly ask me for money whilst the most they do are write "Strongly worded letters" and finger wagging, Rep. Green's website was all about service to his district. I literally could not find a way to donate to him. But he is now a hero of mine. If only HE or one of the few with his courage and fire were leading the Dems. I wish he were 20 years younger. He'd have made a great president.
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The American people need to take the French route. “Off with their heads!”
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The French would already have shutdown the airports, blockaded highways and lit a fire under Paris.
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Man, I wish this country still had the balls to deal with traitors the way they're supposed to be dealt with.
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it goes, it goes, it goes, it goes, it goes...
GUILLOTINE
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How many universities will abandon free speech rights for 10% of their budget? Hard to say, many abandoned them for less when students were protesting genocide.
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It's the USA, the only things that matters is money. Universities are already run like business so dont expect anything else than financial decisions. It will just make usa even more under-educated if that's even possible. Higher education wont mean anything exceot that your parents are rich.
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How many universities will abandon free speech rights for 10% of their budget?
All of them. Of course they'll frame it like "to enable our storied institution to continue performing our vital work, we are temporarily putting a moratorium on non-pre-approved meetings. Thank you for your understanding."
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I'm masking and spray painting cameras. Cry about it, butterball.
670 comments